#so many people who were like thrust into the public as children

[alarrylarrie]

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[lady-lauren]

❥ SATORU GOJO X FEM! READER

❥ WORD COUNT: 2.1k

❥ WARNINGS/TAGS: incest (big brother/little sister), hatefucking, degradation, Satoru's hand smothering your mouth, some dub-con tones but really you both want this fucked up situation, semi-public sex (the door isn't closed and it really should be), creampie

Dead Dove Do Not Eat. Read those warnings again.

→ Kinktober Masterlist ←

You’ve always eclipsed his light. A stain on his legacy, a re-shifting of the scales when you were born.

Always on his heels, nipping at his skin. 

Satoru wonders how many times the two of you have tangled like this—fury and jealousy, adults carrying the bitterness of spoiled children.

“Are you even trying?” 

You’re pinned beneath him, both of you wild and uncoordinated, driven more by emotion than immeasurable skills. 

“Fighting dirty isn’t fair, ‘Toru,” your tits are heaving as you try to catch your breath, hips squirming and bucking to keep mean fingers from playing with the one toy he was never allowed to have.

“Excuses, excuses,” he tuts, bicep flexing as he catches your wrist in an attempt to scratch his cheek, “you like when I play dirty, little whore.”

One step away from a tense family dinner had him cornering you in some tucked away office with your dress bunched around your hips on the floor.

Satoru thought fucking you would depredate you, make you take on the burden of his sins. Instead it’s only wrecked him further. Now he tastes you in the back of his cheeks whenever he looks in the mirror.

God he hates you. Because you make him sick, make him do sick, nasty things and you barely try to fight back. 

“It’s like you want to get fucked by your brother, hm?” he thinks aloud before pressing his mouth against yours. He cups your neck, pulls you closer, pays attention to how you grunt and tug at his shirt. Your nails catch buttons, scratch into skin. 

He shouldn’t kiss you here, where any roaming maid or distant cousin could catch a glimpse of what the Gojos do when no one is looking. 

But he’s at a point where he wants people to look, wants people to see just how fucked up you both are.

“Toru,” you hiss, “stop, get off—”

“Oh shut the fuck up. We don’t have time for the but ~Satoru~ we shouldn’t song and dance. You always let me have you, so be quiet and take it.” 

Still, you fight, like you always do. Your toned muscles push and shove, one leg nearly smashing air from his lungs. He catches your calf in time, insatiably mean fingers digging into your soft flesh and forcing your thighs apart. He can tell you bite back a whine of pain, too prideful to let him know when he hurts you.

“You cannot do this here in the fucking floor of—” 

“Really? Would you rather me take you to your old bedroom so you can cuddle your stuffies while big brother fucks you stupid? Hm? Is that what you want?” 

“What I want,” you try to pull his hair like a child, “is for you to find someone else to be obsessed with. What about Sugu? Oh, that’s right you—”

Just the sound of that name makes him want to rip you apart, smash you to such small pieces that he’ll never have to think of you again. Satoru clamps his hand over your babbling mouth, squeezing until his knuckles turn white and you actually whimper.

He’s going to fuck you into the floor, into oblivion, until all you can think about is him. It’s only fair. 

Satoru keeps the pressure on your mouth, forcing his free hand between your spread thighs so he can shove two long fingers into your cunt. Your panties are soaked around the edges of his knuckles, pussy drooling and squishy as he thrusts and scissors in the way he knows will make your eyes roll. 

“You sure are wet for someone who doesn’t want this.” 

He knows you do. You don’t have to tell him—you probably never will say the exact words aloud. He won’t either. 

You roll your hips back as he fingers you, the dress around your hips falling open like wilting petals against your skin. 

The palm of his hand eats your moans, still small and breathy, desperate to feel more than just the squelching spread of his fingers. 

He wants to punish you, wants to bruise your pussy with his knuckles and make you scream. But he doesn’t have that kind of patience. His cock is smothered in his pants, straining and thumping against the floor. Pre is already leaking into threads; he feels another drop bead against his cockhead as your cunt squeezes when he curls his fingers into a spongy spot that makes you buck.

It’s so wrong and fucked up that he knows that soft spot within you, knows that if he rubs it a few more times it might actually make you cum in his hand.

“God, is your slutty cunt this messy for other guys? Such a fucking pain in the ass—you’re gonna stain the rug.”

Only he loves how easy access your slick makes you. Just a few movements—glossy hand down his pants, shoving the waistband down over his ass, plugging his tip into your hole—and he can thrust his cock all the way to the back of your pussy. 

You manage to bite into the side of his palm, canines pressing into sinew as you weep for him.

Fuck you feel so good, too good, tight and full with the most familiar, decadent squeeze around his thick shaft.

“Pull your tits out,” white lashes flutter as he pushes in, out, “lemme see ‘em.” 

Like always, your fight is gone the moment he’s buried in your cunt. Your hands scramble to obey him, nearly ripping the delicate straps of your dress so you can pull it down, breasts falling on display. Satoru keeps his eyes on the bouncing fat, biting his tongue when your nipples harden into the most delicious looking buds.

You muffle a cry at a particular cruel thrust, legs starting to burn and shake from the weight of his hips between them. Your lips are swelling behind his hand, sloppy with drool. 

Satoru shifts back, getting on his knees so he can curl your leg against your bare chest and worm his way to the very depths of your pussy. The sound is lewd, all wet and gushing, each push of skin on skin making him prickle.

His keen senses perk—footsteps in the hallway, voices through the wall. Dinner guests shuffling about in the absence of the prodigal siblings. 

Your eyes flash toward the cracked door, yet the little ah, ah, ah~ behind his palm won’t quit.

“Yeah? You want someone to find us? Want them to see how your big brother pounds into your guts because he can? Because you’re a little fucking slut who lets me?”

The annoyance that flares to life as your gaze returns to him has his balls tightening. You hate that he gets the best of you. This is the one way he can, by making you weak and wet and willing for his cock.

Satoru presses his hand to your belly, presses in deep and hard until the heel of his hand meets the outline of his dick. 

“Feel that? Feel how fucking full you are with my cock?” 

He uses strength he couldn’t on anyone else, barreling his hips until you’re moving back on the floor, rug scrunching beneath your bodies as he pounds into you so recklessly. 

You whine, actively try to bite his hand, to suck his skin, to hurt him. 

“Oh please, you can take it. You’re a Gojo.”

That reminder makes you both groan, your cunt sucking as his cock swells. 

He wonders for a split moment what really draws you together. Lust? Failed parenting? Some mutual sense of rebellion? All of it, probably, and some other sick, twisted shit laced in between. 

Your little fingers start prying at his over your mouth, clawing and plucking his knuckles. 

He shows a little mercy and releases his hold on you, only to clamp both hands down on your hips so he can fix your pace and build a faster rhythm. 

You suck in a deep breath, “Kiss me.” 

A pale brow quirks at your request, smirk tugging at his cheek. 

“Really? And why should I? Thought you didn’t like me.” 

“Oh my, ah, god, Toru, I ask for one nice thing. Just,” you reach for him, gripping onto his flexing biceps and pulling him down, “just do it, for me.”

He was always going to oblige you. He hates admitting it, but he’d kiss you all the time, if you’d let him. 

Satoru’s lips meet yours with a bruising fervor. 

Your hand tugs in his snowy hair, drags him closer. Your mouth moves against his, eyes closed, suddenly greedy and hungry; for what, neither of you really know. All he does know is that you still taste the same, like home, and he wants your breath in his lungs.

He is a snake, wrapping around you, suffocating, crushing until you can’t breathe anything but the poison he spits.

Your mouth slants for him, a hum resounding from both your throats as your stomach starts to get tight, tell-tell pulls and sucks like you’re begging him to keep stroking the flames.

“You’re so spoiled, aren’t you,” he groans into your mouth, lips messy with spit, “you gonna cum just from my cock? Do I fuck you that good?”

“God, sh-shove that fat cock deep and cum inside me—”

Your demand makes his blood run hot. 

Satoru throws his head back and laughs, maniacal and oh so satisfied. “You’re spoiled fucking rotten. That’s what mommy and daddy did to you, spoiled you so fucking much you think you deserve everything. Even me.”

Because you started this, didn’t you? When you got old enough to be so fucking tempting in your twenties, started flirting with his friends and batting your pretty eyes at all the higher-ups. When you got strong enough to match him, to take up space in his light.

“Fuck you,” you purr like you’re trying to mean it, like you’re trying to deny him. “Hate you so fucking, ah, god–shit—” he’s got your clit pinched between his fingers now, pressing until he knows it hurts, “make me cum and let me go.”

White hair spreads into the sweat of your skin as he buries his face in your neck. He’s so close to losing it, to being done with this.

“I’ll do one of those things. Let you figure out which one.”

Satoru grinds his cock into your gummy walls, cock strangled in your suction. His pelvis is rolling against your clit, coarse curls making your legs twitch. 

The moment he gets his thumb over your clit, it’s like dropping a match into gasoline. You both burn so hot, melting into one another as he explodes and you convulse. No matter how many times he feels you cum, hears you whisper his name and choke on the three little words you never say, he will never get used to it. 

So familiar and foreign and fucked up, the kind of drug that scratches at his brain and begs from more. 

He empties his balls into you, creaming into a cunt he should never touch let alone fill to the brim. 

You’ve never told him he can’t, that he shouldn’t. You both know it’s abhorrent, disgusting, but maybe that’s why you keep letting him do it. 

He’ll still watch you take your morning pill, though, just to make sure.

Your bodies lie panting in a forgotten corner of the home you both hate, the scent of sex rolling in the air like smoke.

“Get off me and go.” 

Shame is wavering in your voice, it always does. He can understand why you feel it—he does too, he just morphs it into some kind of wicked hatred so he can still sleep at night. 

“One last ~kiss~?” He mocks your voice and revels in how you claw your way out from under him, trying to pull yourself back together and catch the cum dribbling down your thigh. 

“Fuck you. Fuck this. It won’t happen again.” 

And it shouldn’t. But it does. It always happens again. 

Because he wants to hurt you, shame you, make you feel weak in his arms when you shatter and cum. Because he hates how much he loves you. So he wants to crush you, wrap around you like a viper and pop you out of existence. 

His life would be so much easier if he didn’t have a spoiled brat of a sister. 

You make him want to eat his fist when you swipe his cum from between your legs and put your fingers in your mouth, smiling because you know he’ll return to dinner with a tent in his pants. 

You live to torture him, he’s sure of it. 

[worlds-worst-ships]

Ad Libs: KSI gets shooting pains in his nards from how sexually frustrated DanTDM has made him, so he spaffs so hard that Dan's minecraft server crashes

~A Tale Of True Unrequited Love~

*Click "keep reading" for some extremely cartoonish sexual content*

Contains: Monster c*ck, Mpreg, use of food, pillowf*cking, extreme load fetish, a tiiiiny bit of scat, a happy ending with a wedding.

Dan. He was the people's YouTuber. One whom, amidst a maelstrom of allegations and wealth-fuelled madness, has become what every man wishes he could be... truly normal. Succesful, revered, one of the greats, but nonetheless, down to earth in such a way that you'd be forgiven for not realising you're in the presence of greatness were you to walk past him in the street and pay him no mind. His channel, fanbase, and his beautiful wife and children, the spoils of his long and illustrious career, the battery powering the eternal engine that is his well-earned happy future. And beneath his modesty, as any man would be, Dan is proud of what he has accomplished. Proud, yet not swollen with pride. Some, however, were...well..."torn" when it came to what to make of him.

Some, that is, being KSI and his fanbase. Well, his fans won't have time to read the story, because Cbeebies stops airing at 6pm and they have to go to bed before school tomorrow, so we'll leave them out of it and focus on their idol. Yes, KSI, from the screen to the ring to the pen to the king, with his crown and his bling, its always trouble when he rings. And ring, he did... by that, of course, I mean rim his ring until his keyboard looked like someone stamped on a pile of jellyfish when DanTDM popped up in his twitter mentions. Dan was the envy of many men, but most of all to KSI. Despite how illogical it was, KSI couldn't possibly imagine how Dan could sleep every night next to his wife and not him. How it was her that he kissed every day, her who got to make him dinner, her he made love with... it made him feel so left out. So lonely. So lost.

Hence, after years of waiting, when Dan mentioned him on twitter, KSI simply lost control. He couldn't hold it in anymore. His scrotum crumpled up like a sheet of foil, his mouth began foaming, his nipples hardened, and his KSI (Knee-length Sausage Incinerator) hardened to the point where it began to come to life, the urethra opening up like a mouth and screaming like Arnold did in the Predator movie.

It was negative publicity, an attack against the ultimate wonder-meal that would soon cure cancer that is Lunchly, but it didn't matter. This was as good of an excuse as any. KSI ran to his room, grabbed his pillow, threw it to the floor of his office, stabbed a hole in it, then placed his PC and monitor on the floor. Then, while furiously mating-pressing the pillow, he began his onslaught against Dan.

Hours became days. Days became weeks. KSI pounded the pillow into oblivion, wishing it could be Dan, wishing Dan would do the same to him, posting one tweet with every thrust. His PRIME (Pre-cum Releasing Immediately, Multiplying Excitement) was gushing through the pillow and into the carpet, seeping through the ceiling downstairs.

"DAAAANNNN!!!! DAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNN!!!!! I NEED YOU DADDY, DAAAAAAANNNNN!!!! Shrieked JJ, hitting record on his microphone so that the sounds of him fucking the pillow could be made into a beat for a new song. "DDDAAAAANNN!!! EAT MY ASS LIKE A LUNCHLY, DAAAAAANNNNNN!!!!"

Did I mention Dan had no idea this was happening? Anyway...

Olajide still wasn't satisfied. His pillow was burnt to shreds now. He was simply penetrating a hole in the ground he had made. Dan was yet to respond, and he couldn't bust until he did. He truly needed something, anything from Dan. And then...

Dan responded. He posted a tweet. But for KSI, it was sweet sorrow... the best he was going to get. "Living the dream" said Dan, posting pictures of him having fun with his family.

It would have to do.

With a mighty squeal, KSI finally let loose his love custard. His fuck muck. His Olajizze. His KSI (klumpy spunk injection) cascaded from the tip of his willy, completely staining the carpet as if a bucket of yogurt had been spilled. The carpet was two inches thicker than last month due to weeks of P R E, and now KSI finally had his release.

Dan, meanwhile, was playing a rousing game of minecraft, when all of a sudden, he hears something... a loud, sorrowful voice seemingly from miles away. It said "GYORSH, PLEASE FIST MY KNOB HOLE DADDY DAN!!!!" sending vibrations through his entire house, crashing his minecraft server. Confused, but not particularly bothered, dan just did something else with his evening.

KSI on the other hand, went to sleep exhausted, his meaty clackers still in pain from the need for Dan's touch.

Dan still plagued his dreams. They looked something like this.

But they were just that... dreams. Or so he thought.

THREE MONTHS LATER

There was set to be a con in London today. All the big YouTubers would be there. Well, they'd be in private booths drinking champagne and avoiding their fans like lepers, but they'd be there. Including KSI.

On the fated day, KSI arrived at the con, still missing the sweet parasocial touch of DanTDM. This wasn't even enemies to lovers anymore. It was just fucking pathetic. No matter how many tweets, how many nuts, how many cheeky toilet wanks during Sidemen shoots, KSI just wasn't satisfied. It would never be enough.

Amidst the hustle and bustle of the con, KSI in his zoned out state occasionally bumps into someone. After a few times, he thinks "Man, I need to get a grip, huh?". Thats when...IT happened.

KSI bumped into someone. Again.

"Sorry man, my bad" he said.

"No worries" the person replied, walking away, not really registering that he'd just bumped into KSIOlajideBT.

Wait...that was...no way...

It was DAN!!! KSI was truly elated. He wanted to run up to his beloved daddy, tackle him to the ground, and rub his baseball bat willy up and down his ribs like a xylophone, but by time he turned around, his daddy was already long gone.

Needless to say, he was distraught. Dan was probably going back to the wife he envied so much. No more chances. No more Dan. KSI had lost his one chance at the ultimate nut.

But then, as if sent by God himself, the G.O.A.T Deji appears with two boxes in his hands.

"HEY JJ, ITS COMEDYSHORTSGAME- oh, sorry, force of habit. I got you a chicken wrap. Here you go, bro." he said, handing Olajizzums his wrap.

KSI knew what he had to do. He looked at the end of this wrap. The way it was folded. The way it stared at him, so tight, so cute. The way a few drops of BBQ sauce leaked out of the end. It reminded him of one thing.

Of course... it was bussy. He would use this wrap as an allegory for bussy, and mate with it until the very planet itself shook, right here, and right now.

KSI unsheathed his love steak, slamming it with the force of Tommy Fury's right hook into the end of the wrap. With Deji looking on in horror, KSI made a stir-fry out of the chicken wrap with his nigh sentient leviathan winky, bucketing paddling pools worth of pre-cum all over the convention floor. Imagining it was Dan. Wishing Dan would do it to him. Longing for a pickaxe up the bumbum, courtesy of his one true love.

Deji wanted to be pissed off, but he was honestly kinda impressed, so he did some tiktok dances while his brother made it possible to get chicken wraps pregnant.

Opening the floodgates on his pained and blueballed ballbag, KSI released his population pudding into the wrap, and for several hundred meters up the street. The A2 was congested for hours because of it. The sperm cells were the size of bloodhounds due to how pent up KSI was over Dan, so the army had to fight them. They won btw.

Another three months later;

Due to the absolute bussy bludgeoning KSI gave the chicken wrap, it ended up getting preggers. So technically, KSI discovered the secret to Mpreg, which would be a really good tag for this post, but also a reason for KSI and the chicken wrap to get married. Not because they love each other, but because they had to for the kids.

"What should we name the baby?" the wrap asked KSI.

"If its a boy, Daniel. If its a girl, Daniella." KSI replied, rubbing his bellend on the pregnancy bump... in front of all the wedding guests. Yes, I decided chicken wraps have a very short gestation period, thats why there's a bump.

"Isn't that the name of the guy you want to put his wooden sword up your choccy starfish?" said the wrap.

"Wait.. what makes you say I'D be the one getting it up the bum?" said KSI.

"Because you were acting like a bratty bottom on Twitter" responded the wrap, tugging on Olajide's dangly meat eggs, making him giggle.

"Fair" he said.

The result? A 1500 word crackfic that I am fucking sick of writing. Goodbye.

[theonevoice]

Sorry if this is a little foggy and poorly worded, but I have been sitting on this thought all day, after working on a scene from Mamoru Hosoda's Wolf Children, and might as well put it here. The scene in question is the one where little wolf-boy Ame, sweet child who loves stories and picture books and who struggles to come to terms with his hybrid identity, one day while out in the woods with his sister and his mother on a sort of wolf-training excursion suddenly starts crying. And the reason why is crying is that, in all the picture books, he keeps seeing the wolf depicted as the bad guy that ends up shooed away or killed. And because of such representations, now he wants to repress his wolf identity, that has always been a lively and funny, although hard to figure out, part of his life. He is terrified of being what he is because the narrow representations that he has access to tell him that the world does not like people like him. It's a powerful little moment in a beautiful movie, that always makes me tear up, and if you missed it I highly recommend you watch it. If you are not into anime movie and just curious of the scene, I found a clip on YouTube:

Anyway, this scene made my lonely braincel twitch, and I was thinking, now that we are approaching the end of this glorious - as far as the mediascape is concerned - year 2023, that many people underestimate the enormous power of fantasy narratives in expanding the borders of gender (and minority in general) representation. Having an author canonically establish that certain fixed categories do not apply to one or more characters for in-universe reasons takes away that nasty oblique excuse that some people use to deny and disparage diversity in media (where I live they usually sound like "they only made this character a person of color to please the woke liberalsTM even if the historical context doesn't allow it", or even, comically, "it is narratively implausible that this character is or shows to be queer but they were forced to do it by THE GAY LOBBY" - yes, this is an actual conspiracy theory loudly promoted by Italian journalists and politicians, and yes, I am personally deeply ashamed by it). Obviously, almost none of said people has the faintest actual interest in narrative aspects, but they still use the excuse to pollute the public discourse and attack minorities. And I am aware that there is a possible dark pitfall here: in the best possible world, we should not need to take the route of fantasy settings to have something that should never have been denied in the first place, but from a pragmatical standpoint it does work. Having authors saying "nope, sorry not sorry, they are wolf-children / angels and demons / weird vampires / anachronistic pirates in a fantasy context so your self-proclaimed laws of plausibility do not apply and you can shove them where the sun does not shine while we enjoy the show and put this beautiful, funny, delicate, deep and sad things on screen", is like having a cultural picklock which is also a cultural battering ram thrusting the representation-door open. Shows like Good Omens, Our Flag Means Death, What We Do in the Shadows (and their fandoms with their massive collective creative endeavour), by offering the symbolic shield of a fantasy setting can establish a safe space where 1. queer people (especially young people but not only) can finally recognize themselves and stop feeling like they are alone and don't have the words and images they need to describe themselves; 2. not queer people can get used to a larger set of possible identities and not only realise that 100% of said idenities are in fact - hold on to your butts - still people with thoughts and feelings and needs, but also, through the power of mimesis, acquire a deeper understanding of forms of life that they don't directly experience. Including, hopefully, understanding how similar we all are when it comes to us being ultimately a bunch of naked apes who walk on this spinning rock trying to be as little miserable as possible.

Again, sorry if this sounds clumsy and blunt, given how delicate and complex this subject is (one does not simply walk into Mordor talk about the lives and needs of other people like that), but I had this thought stuck in my shallow brain wrinkles and I wanted to try and put it into words.

[bossmamacita]

Hiii long post ahead~~ this is some random history and fun facts about my boss Luz! I keep drawing her so it was time for the info dump. Suggestions and feedback always appreciated! Parts of this are based on my Colombian family lore so LMAO

Luz Armando Vega-Luna

Pre-SR1

In the shadows of Colombia's lush landscapes, Luz was born into a world that refused to see her for who she truly was.

Luz's existence as Cesar felt like a prison, shackled by the chains of her religion and culture. From the moment she drew her first breath, she knew that she was different, a fact she couldn’t communicate that filled her with a seething, simmering rage that threatened to consume her and those around her.

In the tumultuous environment of her childhood home, Luz found herself locked in constant conflict with her mother, Maria, whose strict adherence to Catholicism strained their relationship. Luz's relationship with her sister Elena was marred by their mother's manipulations, pitting them against each other. However, amidst the chaos, Luz discovered solace in her bond with her father, Armando, who shared her love for cars, the outdoors, and music. Through these shared passions, Luz found temporary respite from the turmoil, finding moments of peace in the midst of the storm.

Despite her father's attempts to provide comfort and guidance, Luz could not escape the tragedy that loomed on the horizon.

One summer night, Luz awoke to a fire. As their home became a blazing inferno, Elena shielded Luz from the worst of the flames, but not without bearing scars of her own. Amidst the chaos of fleeing, tragedy struck with brutal finality as their father, Armando, fell victim to violence, his life extinguished in the kitchen of their burning home.

It was clear to Maria that Armando had involvement in illicit affairs and had drawn the wrath of dangerous forces, sealing his fate with a bullet to the skull. As Maria fled with her children in tow, the flames of violence and betrayal illuminated the darkness that had engulfed their lives. Luz found odd comfort in it.

In the aftermath of the tragedy, Luz, Maria, and Elena couch-surfed, aiming to cross the US border. Despite the hardships, Luz's relationship with Elena improved, finding comfort as Maria's influence waned. Luz found solace in the nurturing relationship with her older sibling where she could explore aspects of sisterhood that aligned with her true self with her sister’s support. Luz’s rage grew like a tumor, poisoning all that surrounded it as Elena began to have medical problems due to the fire. This sped up the households’ progress in crossing the border. Luz worked odd jobs to help out. Luz’s rage for the world only seemed to grow stronger as they got to the border.

After successfully crossing the border, Maria's online boyfriend who lived in Stillwater offered them refuge in his studio apartment, the pair of siblings unaware of the neglect and abuse that awaited them. It happened slowly but the two adults in the house were the worst of the worst. Trapped in a cycle of abuse, Luz found herself thrust into a nightmare of violence and trauma. She focused her skills on surviving and becoming stronger.

As Luz grappled with the tumult of puberty and the torment of their living situation, she flunked out of public school. She had a few friends but wouldn’t call any of them close. Her education was not amazing but she was exposed to many different types of people that helped her explore her identity. Despite Elena's attempts to intervene and guide her onto a different path, Luz found herself inexorably drawn into the dark underworld that surrounded them.

As Elena's health deteriorated, their abusers remained indifferent to her suffering, leaving Luz to bear the burden of their shared trauma and worry alone. When Maria finally took Elena to the hospital, Luz was left behind, consumed by a sense of abandonment and resentment towards her sister for getting to escape due to her illness.

Fueled by her rage and a desperate desire to escape, Luz plunged headlong into a life of crime and violence, navigating the treacherous streets of Stillwater in search of a way out. She made some friends, lovers, enemies. With each illicit act, she clawed her way towards independence, determined to carve out a new life free from the shackles of her past. Her personality shifted from pure rage to something more controlled and witty, using her rage as a well-placed weapon in place of an explosion of undiluted rage.

But even as she forged ahead, Luz remained tethered to her sister, sending her money and paying for the hospital stay. Her true vulnerability was Elena. Afraid of cursing or condemning Elena to death, Luz kept her distance and called her regularly in place of visiting.

In the grimy streets of Stilwater, Luz found a temporary reprieve from the suffocating weight of her past. Growing out her hair brought a measure of relief from her dysphoria, yet she continued to present as Cesar until she felt she amassed the resources and confidence to transition fully. Amidst the chaos, she explored new hobbies and worked to heal the wounds within herself, determined to forge a path towards authenticity and self-acceptance. Then she was in the wrong place at the wrong time and stumbled into joining the Saints.

SR1

I need to play the game more LOL. Luz loves being in the Saints. I do canon that Luz names herself Luz after seeing Luz Avalos and is like “this damn woman dont even know her shoes…. nice name tho I’m taking that lol��� its not like anyone calls Luz by her name anyway as the Boss character but it’s still funny. Relationship wise I think she gets along with Johnny the most due to chaos factor. I am not super sure how she would be with Troy or Dex or the others yet I will add to this later! Definitely likes Lin and Aisha tho.

Random:

- Elena has burn scars from protecting Luz from the fire. She later develops medical problems due to her wounds and lungs from this event. Specifically, I think of scar contractures that cause her to need physical therapy due to constricted movement, COPD, and PTSD.

- Armando was a priest or some form of clergy member and not actually married to Maria. He faced criticism in the community for having children out of wedlock, not being married to Maria, and they were planning on moving near the time he was assasinated. He tried his best with Elena and Luz to not have them be shunned in the community. He was in the process of trying to get married, gaining money for it through illicit means, as Maria had given up, assuming his faith would be chosen over her so she dated around.

- Luz Age Timeline: 10-12 years old, the death of her father and escaping. 13-15 years old, the family couch surfs in Colombia and they make it over the US border. 16-18 years old, they move in with Maria’s boyfriend in Stillwater and Elena is admitted to the hospital. 19-20 years old, Luz leaves to get her own apartment and is a criminal. 21 years old is when she was in the wrong place at the wrong time and SR1 begins.

- Luz’s first acts of being a criminal are in car hijacking and fucking things up mechanically due to her childhood knowledge.

- Luz beats the shit out of her mother and the boyfriend as she collects her stuff when she moves out lol.

- Luz gets a tattoo to remember her father after she moves out from her mother’s boyfriend’s apartment as a respect to him and her new beginning. Maybe a candle or flame? This is also the start of Luz’s transition. She looks androgynous for the most part but does not fully transition until near the end of SR1 where she feels big and safe enough to pop on over and get the procedures and whatnot done to feel at peace. (Giant boobs) (Super bimbofication hell yes)

- Personality wise, Luz starts as a conduct disorder child that outwardly expresses pure unfiltered rage on anyone. She is pretty extroverted. As she ages she refines her rage into something digestible and uses it in more of a cocky way that is controlled. It’s still pretty easy to piss her off tho.

- headcannon Johnny does not give a fuck that Luz transitions because she’s still the same wild murder machine. “Ok new hair and name. Let’s go murdering” yass ally

- Adding on this: “Hey Johnny this is what post bottom surgery looks like” “Damn you got that thing designer? Cool” LMAOOO just buddies being buddies

- I do not think Luz is emotionally capable of romance apart from hookups in SR1 and before so she definitely sees everyone as homies. I do think her and Johnny are the closest in a bro way. I think her first romantic feelings moment is toward Carlos in SR2. Definitely want there to be a dynamic with Luz being kinda afraid to act on her feelings (i curse everything i touch) so she just doesn’t act and its mutual tension and well… Red Asphalt.

- Also foils of Johnny/Aisha-Boss/Carlos is fun so yeah their friendship strengthens by the end of it but I think they both get angry and push back at both traumatic events so there’s some angst there

- I want Luz and Johnny to get together eventually but I think its pretty down the line out as Aisha was the love of Johnny’s life and Luz respects it and has unresolved emotional issues following acting on her heart

- I like the nickname Luli for her

[theres-whump-in-that-nebula]

I have been mistaken for so many different people and ages my whole life and it’s kind of funny

5th Grade — ?:

So for reference: I have baby face syndrome, but I’ve always dressed neatly and in a way VERY unconventional for my age group; often wearing vintage clothing, fancy hats, heels, tucked-in shirts, granny sweaters, men’s clothes, etc. Anyway, I never liked holding my dad’s hand in public past age the age of ten, because some dingus would always assume we were husband and wife. Oh hell no. Once it happened while my mother was standing right next to him (and the guy was an Jehovah’s Witness elder, because of course he was).

7th Grade:

I was asked point-blank by a 20-year-old “So have you graduated high school yet?” No, I’m twelve and suffering through the doldrums of middle school. Yes, this is a cry for help.

8th Grade:

The first day of school, I walked into art class. I was wearing coooorduroy britches dodging hitches I was working on the railway a gray sheath dress with a yellow blouse underneath of it, stockings, and high gray platforms. Very corporate, I guess. And I’ve known how to walk (run, and skip) in heels since age seven; so I was not awkward-looking at all.

I made a beeline for the teacher’s desk to get a look at the seating chart. The teacher, upon seeing me enter the room, went to shake my hand, asking my name, and if I’m the new student-teacher. I was like, “No; I’m a student. I’d just like to know where to sit.”

Later on that year, crazy hair day came along, and I wore a short blonde wig to school (I used to have 40” of hair). I confused the hell out of my history teacher because she thought I was a different kid sitting in her student’s spot.

9th Grade:

The same thing happened in my pottery class. I shoved my bangs underneath my hat on the first day, and came in with no hat the second. The teacher asked who I was because she hadn’t seen me before. I kind of get that, because it’s hard to spot kids across a playground if they get a haircut or put on a hat. I always look at their gait to tell who’s who.

In the Workforce:

I substituted for someone in a high school classroom, in a 1st — 11th grade school. I was sitting outside the office in a chair because the classroom wasn’t open yet. At that moment, I wasn’t on my phone and was halfway staring off into space, probably cracking my knuckles or something. I was dressed casually (cargo pants and a sweater), with a bag at my side on the floor.

This staff member walked past me, then back again to say “hello.” I said “hello” back. He asked some question about why I was sitting out in the hallway, and if I was lost. I replied that I was there from another school to substitute for a staff member, as I am a paraprofessional, and had been asked to sit in the hallway until the teacher arrives.

“Oh. Sorry, I thought you were a student. I haven’t seen you before, ahaha…” Very awkward.

Later on, the students in the district had an Autism Acceptance Walk. We had to walk through a tunnel of people, who gave the kids (and adult students) high-fives. Apparently, people thought I was one of the students, because they were thrusting their hands out at me, specifically, to high-five them, despite the fact that I was surrounded by a bunch of tiny children. I heard someone say “she’s cute” in a diminutive tone (it had to be about me, because the only other feminine person around was an imposing older lady). To be fair though, I’ve consistently gotten scores in the 130s—140s on the RAADS-R (among other online tests); but…….. I don’t know if my traits are a naturally-occurring phenomena or a weird religious trauma-induced thing. I’m also not a student and I wasn’t about to steal their thunder; so after feeling compelled to high-five exactly one person, I kept my eyes forward and didn’t look at anyone but the kids in front of me until we were out of the tunnel.

Towards the end of the year, I met with some corporate people I had never seen in person at a restaurant. I shook their hands and introduced myself with my first name. They were surprised when I sat down with them because they thought I was a waitress… I was wearing all black, and apparently had an air of “business” about me (how else would I act or look around corporate people?) We had a laugh about it

Oh and one time when I was at a mid-level elementary school watching the kids on the playground, the STUDENTS came up to me and asked if I was a kid or a teacher. I— 😂😭 My friends, I’m an adult. I am a Designated Mother Figure.

And consistently, to this day, I get asked a LOT by fellow customers “Excuse me, Miss… Do you know where [item] is?” It always happens in art stores for some reason… maybe it’s my hair? I my hair to express myself? (and for some reason I have an aversion to dying it green)

[rappaccini]

Choose violence please. 12, 13

(🔪) more spider-gwen comics takes then.

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

k this is out of left field: the storm siblings.

i know the mcguire run isn't fondly remembered but it's a victim of editorial fuckery demanding gwen spend half her time on 616 and therefore limiting her homeworld plotlines, snatching the maker away before mcguire could develop him as gwen's new nemesis, and almost certainly stifling the clear gwenjay plot being set up. it has so many great ideas that were just kneecapped before the payoff.

and i know people's reaction to the storms was "influencer heroes? ew." but the storm siblings are great. i get the sense that they were going to form an evil fantastic four with the maker and a thing-that-never-got-the-chance-to-exist, that all the mysterious fires on earth-65 were being set by johnny, that gwen not knowing sue can turn invisible would've led to something crazy, that sue maybe possibly would have tried to fuck her way to the top with the maker the way she did with doom, and that there was a possibility of johnny turning on sue for being too evil, but even with those plots aborted they're still cool.

the lannister twin vibe between johnny and sue is slimy and fascinating and i need more of it.

being the children of a serial killer whose mom thrust them into child stardom is such a wild new backstory for them. and i'll take it over 'scientists stuck in an accident' a fucking gain.

evil fantastic four is such a cool idea. the team won't ever exist but evil storms is still so awesome.

sue fucking her way to the top over in latveria, killing dr doom and wearing his cape as a trophy is So Cool. best sue storm anywhere ever.

no like i fucking love that sue/reed can never happen. reed is 12. she will never even look at him. gwen's world did for sue what it did for her: reshaped reality to make sure she'll never be reduced to The Love Interest/Mother, and gave her the room to be her own agent and far messier than she ever got to be on 616. love that for her.

johnny torching their abusive mother's corpse is 👍.

they have pretty designs that are recognizably Storm Sibling but not Fantastic Four.

and i am frothing at the bit over how mcguire's foreshadowing of gwen's symbiote's weakness being fire definitely would have led somewhere with johnny.

(.... the spideytorch friendship being inverted to gwen and johnny being hateful nemeses is hot! so is the spideytorch friendship being reinterpreted as a sexual/romantic dynamic instead of a platonic one. come on now what was happening there. he's her weakness what the fuck does that mean. and he's starting to turn on his evil sister as she becomes more and more hateful towards gwen. was she gonna fix him? was he gonna make her worse?? were we about to get a fucking brienne and jaime dynamic??? i NEED them to try to kill each other and end up making out. or the reverse.)

and fuck off with the Influencer Villain Bad take. if you wanna shit on the disposable influencer villains of gwenverse and smash, go ahead! those sucked! influencer villains that are just Social Media Bad blow.

but the storms executed that idea so Well. the mcguire run explores gwen grappling with her lack of secret identity and new fame and trying and failing to monetize it. villains who have figured out how to use their celebrity to their advantage are perfect for this storyline. gwen being a hero with a bad reputation has a great foil in the storms, who are villains who have successfully fooled the public into thinking they're heroes. sue storm having this particular hatred of gwen that makes her try to suffocate her and drive her out of earth-65 permanently because she can't stand to see another girl with power and has to be the only one on the pedestal? juicy!

even without an evil fantastic four or the maker in the mix, they could've been the murdock and moon of the mcguire run and deserved so much more than what they got, which is a handful of issues that ultimately use them as a device to exile gwen from her home and then being conveniently disposed of by natasha romanoff offscreen. they're still alive i guess bc they're in orlando's sinister six brady bunch setup but god knows if we'll ever see them again.

the potential is incredible in terms of what it means for earth-65. there will never be a fantastic four bc reed's a kid and ben is a middle-aged cop. reed is 12, so reed/sue will Never Happen and their kids will never exist. sue killed dr doom and took his place so everything doom does is off the table and god knows what the fuck is going on geopolitically since latveria has no leader. what the hell happens if galactus shows up there's no one to stop him.

it's an incredible catalyst for a plot about gwen finding balance in her life as a public hero, or accepting that she'll never be the perfect girl loved by the public that sue is, or realizing she can't work alone anymore and needs allies, or having some kind of symbiote-related conflict due to johnny that leads to a hell of a rivalry, friendship or romance... and she never gets to complete any of this because of spiderverse synergy.

and nobody talks about it. criminal!

13. worst blorboficiation

peter parker. i blame the spiderverse movies for intensifying this, but it was there before because people Love Peter and love ignoring how bad he is for gwen. the depiction of him as a sweet widdle innocent bullying victim who loved gwen and who she would have loved to be with if only he hadn't died...

ok so everybody missed gwen stating repeatedly that she was never attracted to him and uncomfortable with his advances? everybody missed that he turned himself into the lizard because of good old-fashioned misogyny over being angry that A Girl was fighting his battles for him? everybody missed that he got redpilled by their creepy science teacher? everybody missed that he attacked the prom because he was angry that his best friend was going out with gwen instead, and wanted to literally kill that friend to punish her for not being attracted to him? everybody missed that this peter is an extremely obvious incel allegory?

think it through: a socially outcasted (white) teenage boy who feels entitled to romantic affection from a girl who's made it clear that she doesn't want him, has his anger about not having power over her and his peers manipulated by creepy older men, and decides to bring a weapon to the school prom and use it on all his classmates, starting with that girl and her date, to punish her for not wanting to fuck him? and then immediately gets remembered as a sweet little boy who did nothing wrong, who has hotlines and memorials made in his honor, triggers other white boys to commit copycat crimes and gets the girl he victimized ostracized by everyone she knows? does this remind you of something?

earth 65's peter parker is a school shooter allegory. and the fandom treats him like an uwu baby and wishes the girl he was trying to kill loved him back. (and the spiderverse movies just backed that up because of course the chucklefucks who think gwiles is good would do that.)

i'm just gonna say it: yes, Gwen Shouldn't Have Killed Him Because Lethal Force Is Bad but i'm glad gwen killed his ass! good for her! stomp on his ribs a bit more!

[semper-legens]

50. Diamonds in the Mud, by Brian Reade

Owned?: No, library Page count: 343 My summary: A celebration of working-class heroes - from the Hillsborough mothers to the legends of football, here are a selection of working-class people who have made a real difference in the world, and whose legacies should be celebrated alongside people from posher backgrounds. My rating: 4/5 My commentary:

Now, here's a book with a definite audience, and that audience is named me. While my background is a lot more middle class than working class, I still rail against the overexposure of moneyed, posh people in our pop culture, and particularly when it comes to the 'heroes' that we 'must' celebrate. No, I don't think I particularly care about Winston Churchill, actually - the man was a horrible racist and that fact hardly ever comes up in discussions of him, the focus instead being on his efforts as Prime Minister during the Second World War, to the point where it's practically taught that he alone was responsible for the Allies winning the War, never mind all the other countries and people who were, you know, actually doing the fighting. But I digress. Reade is clearly a champion for the working class, in a very familiar, Liverpudlian way. His focus is very much on Liverpool and the North West, though not all of the people he spotlights are from here. Some might criticise him for provincialism. I wouldn't be one of them, though. I was born in Liverpool, and it's still my closest city. The North West often goes underrepresented in English media. Hell yeah, is what I'm saying here.

Anyway, the meat of this book is spotlighting a selection of working-class people who could rightfully be dubbed heroes. And all of them are interesting in themselves. One highlight is the Hillsborough mothers, the parents of those killed in the Hillsborough disaster in 1989 and spent the years after searching for justice for their children and campaigning for the truth to be officially recognised. They endured so much scorn and abuse for going against the establishment in the way that they did, and their long years fighting for justice for the 96 (now 97) victims of the disaster are worthy of acknowledgement. Another highlight is Doreen Lawrence, the mother of Stephen Lawrence, who was murdered in a racist attack that was swept under the rug for years. Like the Hillsborough victims, Stephen was blamed for his own murder; like the Hillsborough mothers, Doreen rose to the occasion despite her grief and spent many long years fighting for her son's death to be recognised as a murder. She was just an ordinary person, who should not have been thrust into the public eye as she was. She's a hero, though her story isn't taught at schools. By and large, Reade's emotive reporting gives a lot to the stories presented here, though sometimes he does centre himself in the narrative. I get it, but it does come across as somewhat egotistical from time to time. Nevertheless, this is a really interesting book, subverting the common British narrative that only upper-class moneyed people did anything of note, ever. A good read!

Next, a short story collection, and a touch of magic in the air.

[richincolor]

Book Review: The Blackwoods

Title: The Blackwoods

Author: Brandy Colbert

Genres:  Contemporary

Pages: 384

Publisher: Balzer + Bray

Review Copy: ARC by publisher

Availability: Available now

Summary: The Blackwoods. Everyone knows their name. Blossom Blackwood burst onto the silver screen in 1962, and in the decades that followed, she would become one of the most celebrated actors of our time—and the matriarch of the most famous Black family in Hollywood. To her great-granddaughters, Hollis and Ardith, she has always just been Bebe. And when she passes away, it changes everything. Hollis Blackwood was never interested in fame. Still, she’s surrounded by it, whether at home with her family or at the prestigious Dupree Academy among Los Angeles’ elite.

When private photos of Hollis are leaked in the wake of Blossom’s death, she is thrust into the spotlight she’s long avoided—and finds that trust may be a luxury even she can’t afford. Ardith Blackwood has always lived in the public eye. A television star since childhood, she was perhaps closer with Blossom than anyone—especially after Ardith’s mother died in a drug overdose. Ever since, she has worked to be everything her family, her church, and the public want her to be. But as a family secret comes to light and the pressures from all sides begin to mount, she wonders what is left beneath the face she shows the world.

Weaving together the narratives of Hollis, Ardith, and Blossom, award-winning author Brandy Colbert tells an unforgettable story set in an America where everything is personal, and nothing is private.  

Review: I was talking about Black folk’s movement to Los Angeles with a friend the other day and we were discussing how so many elders from our grandparents generation have so many secrets, I mean, stories that we don’t know and as they pass they take those stories with them to the grave. This idea is at the heart of Brandy Colbert’s newest novel that follows the fallout of a secret that is finally revealed after the matriarch of the family passes away. The Blackwoods, however, are Hollywood royalty so the revelation of the secret has rippling consequences that all happen amid the public eye. 

What makes Colbert’s novel unique is that the story is revealed through Blossom’s story from her mother’s story on the vaudeville stage to how she became a famous star during Hollywood’s Golden Age which wasn’t particularly friendly to Black people. Blossom’s dream of being an actress contradicts the dreams of her boyfriend who wants to get married and have children. Blossom eventually makes the decision to follow her dreams with the support of her mother and sister who help raise her son when she travels to New York to work, creating the secret that had long followed the family - who was the father of Blossom’s son. I really enjoyed traveling on Blossom’s journey as she rose in her career because I really connected with her desire to follow her dream despite the challenges. She had a strong sense of self which allowed her to make hard decisions but to also not allow people to take advantage of her. There were times where she knew the choice she made would hurt her career but she was not willing to sacrifice her integrity and I loved seeing a character represented in such a manner. Blossom is a figure to look up to and I was able to see how she was able to be the matriarch of such a wonderful family. 

In the present time Hollis, Ardith and the rest of their family are dealing with the passing of Blossom. Hollis and Ardith are cousins but are close like sisters, and lead completely different lives. While Hollis loves her family she doesn’t not enjoy being part of a such a public family and prefers to maintain her private life. Ardith has been raised in the spotlight by being the daughter of an actress and being a child actor herself. While she is used to being in public, she does work to maintain a some sense of privacy as she has a public persona and a private persona. For both girls, the revelation of Blossom’s secret upturns their worlds and both have to re-examine who they are and their place in their world. What I loved about these two storylines is how each of the girl’s voices were very distinct yet somewhat similar as after all they’ve been raised in the same family. Hollis experiences heartbreak and grieves not only the loss of her grandmother but also a close relationship, which causes her to do some deep reflection and discover her inner strength. Ardith, on the other hand, was very close to her grandmother and is learning to live life without her. She realizes how insular her social circle is and works to trust people outside her circle and make friends. Both of the girl’s journeys parallel yet contrast Blossom’s journey as you can see how having Blossom’s great-grandchildren gave them the strength to find themselves and their voice. 

The weaving of the three storylines made for a wonderful read which showed how connected the present is to the past and the importance of family.

[corvidstoneage]

Sword Girl

A short story inspired by a photo of a friends baby daughter holding a sword I made for her.

TW: Implied reference to a (prevented) shooting. No graphic detail.

As always, my work is public creative commons, use whatever you like. It's all WIP.

The wooden sword whirled in the young girls hands as she danced around the two boys on the playground, each of them clutching their own stick desperately as they tried to ward off her ever quickening thrusts and slashes.

If they could just hold out a little longer the teacher would come back and they would be saved the bruising that was sure to come at the simple cost of a firm talking to about fighting during recess.

One of the boys glanced over at the corner of the brick wall hoping to see the teacher and she took the opportunity to send his stick flying into the nearby grass and clobber him over the head with her sword.

The other boy seized the perceived opportunity and turned to run, only to find his feet kicked out from under him as she whirled back around. Her sturdy wooden blade quickly followed the leg she had used to trip him and he found himself staring up at the sky with a matching bruise to his friend as the girl disappeared.

She quickly clambered up the brick wall and onto the school roof. She stashed her wooden sword behind an air conditioning unit and retrieved her dagger. Slipping the thin blade into its hidden sheath within her uniform and glancing around to make sure no teachers were watching she slipped down the wall and into the crowd of girls playing on the opposite side of the playground to the boys who were just now limping back into sight.

They would get in trouble for fighting of course. Rather hard to get away with it if you had bruises from it and were carrying sticks. They wouldn’t tell on her she knew. Few of her fellow children had ever made that mistake and her retribution had been brutal enough to dissuade copycats.

Her first gift, from a family friend who dabbled in such things, had been a wooden sword carved to perfectly fit her tiny hands. She had seized it immediately by the handle and her eyes lit up with excitement.

Her father often said he had known from that moment that she was destined to live by the blade. “An ill omen,” she had heard her mother say at times.

The girl didn’t think it was an ill omen at all. She didn’t have many friends, true, but if she didn’t protect the people who couldn’t protect themselves who would? Even the boys, stupid though they were, knew if they were being bullied all they had to do was make it to one of her informants and safety was guaranteed.

Teachers and administrators would waffle and mutter. “But she’s such a sweet girl, she would never say such a thing.” or “His sports career is so promising, just be patient.”

Patience may be a virtue but it was a virtue she had long since lost.

When she had thrown her first punch and felt it connect with soft human flesh; when she saw the look of shock on the boys face, as if taken aback that anyone would dare stand up to him, she had realized she had the power to keep her people safe from anyone who dared to threaten them.

Her reign was coming to an end she knew. The teachers were starting to realize she was far too strong for an eleven year old who didn’t play any sports, and she carried herself with the confidence of someone three times her age.

Later that day one of her informants passed her a note. Evidently there was a new girl who had only been in town for about a week who was bragging about how she could beat up anyone she pleased and picking on the younger kids in particular.

Between classes she drafted the appropriate challenge and passed it on to her second to deliver to the new girl.

The next day, the proper arrangements having been made, they met behind the school during recess. The seconds conferred over a selection of sticks they had gathered the night before and after careful examination by both seconds selected two of similar size and shape and delivered them to their respective duelists.

This was by no means a new experience for the girl but looking into her opponent’s eyes she found an intelligence there much greater than the typical grade school bullies she had fought before.

She scarcely had time to think on this before the sticks were slamming into eachother as if by their own volition at lightning speed as each girl sought an opening in the others defense.

Mere moments later they both sat outside the office awaiting punishment.

Unfortunately for the poor snitch who had reported the duel their shared detention sentence gave them ample time to discover all the things they had in common and put aside their differences.

As it turned out they lived barely a block apart, and with a proper sparring partner they became an unstoppable force.

And so it was, several years later when the gunman walked into the school expecting an easy target he went back out the same door he came in but with no gun and no pulse. And the two girls cleaning the blood off their daggers in the bathroom together knew that their people would never have cause to fear again.

[creatiview]

[ad_1] Opinion by Neville de Silva (london)Friday, February 03, 2023Inter Press ServiceLONDON, Feb 03 (IPS) - On February 4, Sri Lanka commemorates 75 years of Independence. But it will not be the extravaganza of the past years, the minaturised imitations of the grand displays on Moscow’s Red Square or China’s Tiananmen Square.Still, a critical question has been reverberating in the community ever since the government announced a scaled down celebration to commemorate 75 years since Britain relinquished power in 1948.After defaulting on the country’s debt servicing last April for the first time in its post-independence history and being forced to resort to massive printing of money to meet state expenditure, does Sri Lanka need to celebrate independence day this year however downsized it would be?Particularly so, when President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s government itself claims Sri Lanka is struggling economically and it would take years to recover from its current chaos created by leaders who inexorably pushed it to the tip of the abyss with stupid economic policies, wasteful expenditure and wide- scale corruption and fraud.While imposing unbearable new taxes and other restrictions on the daily lives of the people, driving them further into penury with school children going without meals, fainting in their classrooms and in need of medical treatment which itself is becoming scarce, the country’s leaders don’t seem short of resources for celebrations.Even the country’s diplomatic missions will be holding their annual independence day celebrations as the invitation I received indicated, feasting their countrymen as best as they could. Yet over the last couple of months the government has been selling the story that it has no funds to pay for the Local Government elections due in March. A strange enough claim after President Ranil Wickremesinghe, in one of his other roles as finance minister, presenting the budget for 2023 last November allocated funds for the election and parliament, which oversees public expenditure, approved it.Now, the very persons who allocated money just three months ago claim to lack funds for a constitutionally required election. Punning on the old Harry Belafonte calypso, there is a hole in the budget, said some wag on social media.It is this contradiction in government conduct that an already enraged people find inexcusable. Having got rid of one elected president-- Gotabaya Rajapaksa-- who surreptitiously fled the country last July when mounting peoples’ protests demanded the Rajapaksa clan quit the government, they find themselves confronted with what Sri Lankans have come to see as a Rajapaksa clone-- and now derisively call him Ranil Rajapaksa-- thrust into the presidency to keep the family’s political fires alight. The Roman poet Juvenal dismissively called the delusionary performances staged by the Roman emperors of the time to distract their discontented citizenry, “panem et circensus”- bread and circuses.Bread, like some other essentials, might be scarce or priced beyond the reach of many of its 22 million people. A few months back, the UN agency UNICEF reported that 5.7 million Sri Lankans including 2.3 million children, are in need of humanitarian assistance and the numbers are likely to rise in the coming days.But the country’s leaders are not beyond performing their own circus acts. A few days back President Wickremesinghe appointed two more cabinet ministers bringing the total to 22. Within hours Sri Lankans with their innate sense of humour were on social media branding the new cabinet “Ali Baba and the 22” with the doors to the cabinet still open for more acolytes chosen not for integrity and competence but loyalty.Before the two new ministers fattened the cabinet, splicing off the portfolios of two existing ministers, President Wickremesinghe a couple of months ago appointed 37 state ministers leaving room for three more.Sri Lanka’s bloated ministerial ranks would surely be one of the largest in today’s parliamentary democracies.

Not only is it large in numbers but the perks offered to ministers and state ministers is stunningly staggering--salaries, free housing, several expensive vehicles with fuel, free utilities such as electricity, water, telephones up to a point, several personal staff with paid salaries, armed personal security with escort vehicles, a special allowance for each day they attend parliament, state pension after five years and other facilities not generally known.While the government is prepared to splash state funds on bolstering party cadres and lickspittle who have creamed off state assets, in the last couple of months it has been using every ruse in the books-and some which are not in them- trying to deprive the people of their constitutional right to the franchise, by blocking the Local Government elections due shortly.This election, last held in 2018, is for 340 municipal councils, urban councils and village bodies is scheduled for March 9—the date set by the independent Election Commission last month.But as the day for the election, as constitutionally required, neared, the attempts to stymie it began with grandees of President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s United National Party (UNP) and the Rajapaksa clan-run Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) that is propping up Wickremesinghe with its parliamentary majority, asserting that economic recovery must precede elections.Ministers and even state officials were trotting out excuses that there was no money to fund elections, expecting the populace to have forgotten the budgetary allocation passed by parliament a few months back.As this was being written, internationally-known legal academic and former foreign minister Prof GL Peiris was telling the media the government had made seven attempts to try and stop the election including an affidavit to the Supreme Court filed by the secretary to the finance ministry claiming the state of the economy precluded holding elections right now. The latest ruse was a law called the Election Expenses Bill to control spending for elections hurriedly passed by parliament. If, as Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapaksa said, this proposal has been hanging fire for years, why the rush now, the opposition and anxious voters asked.Like the opposition, the public too smelled a rotten rat. It was seen as another attempt to derail the elections by calling for the provisions of the bill be incorporated which would call for more time.Despite all the public bravura, both the Rajapaksa-controlled SLPP and Wickremesinghe-led UNP which was swept into oblivion at the 2020 general elections, fear that given the mood of the country which rose in mass protests for some seven months last year leading to the resignation of President Rajapaksa and three of his brothers from the cabinet, they would suffer ignominious defeat. Especially so the UNP which lost every single seat including that of party leader Wickremesinghe who managed to creep back into parliament one year later through a clause in the electoral law.Not only would a poor electoral performance by the SLPP and UNP which have now joined hands make governance difficult and troublesome, it would also strengthen public opposition both to the Rajapaksas and President Wickremesinghe who many argue-and rightly so-as a leader rejected by the country two years ago and lacking a popular mandate to rule the country.So what one sees now is a symbiotic relationship between the executive headed by Wickremesinghe and the legislature controlled by the Rajapaksas, running the country and using outdated laws- some dating back to British times- to beat back public dissent, employing the security forces to trample on the constitutionally guaranteed freedoms of the people- free speech and expression, of association and assembly and peaceful protest.It also raises issues about the independence of the Attorney-General and some of the independent institutions set up under the constitution which are believed to have come under pressure during the Wickremesinghe presidency.

With two arms of the state- the executive and legislature under the control of the Wickremesinghe-Rajapaksa- led cabal and backed by the security forces as recent event have shown, Sri Lanka’s increasingly beleaguered populace can only rely for justice on the third arm of the state- an independent judiciary.Over the years the judiciary has, now and then, been under pressure from dictatorial leaders who have not been averse to tamper with justice and the judicial process, sometimes denying impartial, independent judges their rightful place as chief justice or appointing friends or those amenable to the judiciary.But two recent judgements by the Supreme Court have resurrected public faith that the judiciary could be relied on to safeguard the constitution and the peoples’ constitutional and human rights against state abuse of the law and the battering and brutality by the security forces.A few months back the government tried to push through a “Bureau of Rehabilitation Bill” ostensibly to help treat and rehabilitate drug addicts and other drug users. Under cover of that it hoped to incarcerate political dissidents, activists and others which state security would identify those they do not like as ‘trouble makers’.So, it included among those to be included under the law “ex-combatants, members of violent groups, violent extremist person and any other person or group of persons”.The Supreme Court saw through this as an attempt to round up any person the authorities considered a political nuisance and hold them without recourse to the law. The court struck down the clause.Holding that the Bill as a whole violated the constitution, it said it could be acceptable if certain clauses were amended. One of the clauses it found repugnant was the one cited above which the court wanted deleted, leaving rehabilitation open only to drug dependent persons and those identified by law as in need of rehabilitation.In mid-January the Supreme Court delivered a landmark verdict which held former president Maithripala Sirisena, secretary of the defence ministry, police chief and top- ranking intelligence officers, of dereliction of duty and “failure to act” when valid and clear intelligence was passed on by foreign sources of an impending terrorist attacks by Islamic extremists on churches on Easter Sunday in 2019.Some 270 persons including foreigners were killed and several hundred wounded in these attacks on churches and Colombo hotels.Since these were civil cases, President Sirisena was fined 100 million rupees and the others lesser amounts. Sirisena as a former president was no longer entitled to immunity, a lesson for other former and future presidents that they too are liable to civil and criminal action such as corruption and human rights violations once they cease to hold office.These judicial judgments bring some hope to the people that the citadels of power are vulnerable and could be breached by a strong and upright judiciary, the only institution now left to protect and uphold the country’s democratic traditions and norms.If the judiciary is badgered, the last resort is too bloody to contemplate. Neville de Silva is a veteran Sri Lankan journalist who held senior roles in Hong Kong at The Standard and worked in London for Gemini News Service. He has been a correspondent for the foreign media including the New York Times and Le Monde. More recently he was Sri Lanka’s Deputy High Commissioner in London.Source: Asian Affairs, LondonIPS UN BureauFollow @IPSNewsUNBureauFollow IPS News UN Bureau on Instagram© Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press ServiceWhere next?Related newsBrowse related news topics:Latest newsRead the latest news stories:Global Leaders Urge Participation in High-Level Financing Conference to Fund Education for 222 Million Crisis-Impacted Children Friday, February 03, 2023Democracy on the Blink Friday, February 03, 2023UN aid convoys deliver lifesaving relief to Ukraine’s war-ravaged

east Friday, February 03, 2023Peru's Democracy at a Crossroads Thursday, February 02, 2023It's Time to Move Away from Public-Private Partnerships & Build a Future That is Public Thursday, February 02, 2023US Policies Slowing World Economy Thursday, February 02, 2023Insecurity in Nigerias Southern Kaduna: Will the Elections Change the Scenario? Thursday, February 02, 2023Nigeria: UN genocide expert warns against worsening security situation Thursday, February 02, 2023Ethiopia: Northern aid access improving but some areas still hard to reach Thursday, February 02, 2023Resolution of ‘racism’ complaint brought by Qatar against UAE and Saudi Arabia Thursday, February 02, 2023In-depthLearn more about the related issues:Share thisBookmark or share this with others using some popular social bookmarking web sites:Link to this page from your site/blogAdd the following HTML code to your page:Democracy on the Blink, Inter Press Service, Friday, February 03, 2023 (posted by Global Issues)… to produce this:Democracy on the Blink, Inter Press Service, Friday, February 03, 2023 (posted by Global Issues) [ad_2] Source link

[doctorbrown]

Emmett's eyes widen and before he even has a moment to register the blur of movement, his head is caught between her hands, effectively pinning him in place. He neither struggles nor shouts, unsure what to do about the sudden invasion of privacy by a strange woman who dwarfs even him—his friendship with Marty over the years had warmed him back up to human contact after many years of solitude, yet even that came with its awkward trial period where he eased himself into it, learning the boy's tells and preferences.

This is entirely alien to him. People often moved away from him, not towards.

Whether Einstein senses his master's surprise or is simply uncomfortable with seeing him grabbed in such a way by a stranger, he barks, as if to say careful, lady.

He lifts his head as much as he can from where she's trapped it, searching for answers to this strange behaviour, her ramblings, written on the contours of her face.

How does she know this much about me?

Despite his ironic fixture as a somewhat public figure of Hill Valley since his return, if for all the wrong reasons, he fashioned himself a deeply private person. His desire for privacy at times bordered on paranoia, resulting in a number of security measures put in place to deter trespassers where his reputation alone could not scare off the stubborn children.

Solitude was the key to invention, and he had fully intended to see his dream come to life.

Save for the patents on a few inventions he'd filed in his youth that ultimately went nowhere, the details of his inventions were secrets whispered only between himself, Marty, and his faithful canine companions over the years.

He'd not shared the intimate details of his plans with anybody since the late '40s. So for her to know about the brainwave analyser and its unfortunate failureー

Was she in the lab long enough to have read through that much of one of my journals?

Questions upon questions begin to take shape in his mind, sprawling and nebulous just like the barrier of space-time he plans to traverse. For her to be so reluctant to share details of his personal timeline fills him with a hope he'd not felt so strongly since he'd stabilised the temporal containment field, crossing the largest barrier to temporal traversal since his prophetic vision of the flux capacitor thirty years ago.

The answers could be right there if he so chose to ask for them. His entire personal timeline recited like a child's story, spanning decadesーperhaps centuries—all wrapped up at the end to the sound of a book closing.

❝Whatever it is you know about my personal timeline, I don't want to hear it,❞ he says quickly, emphasising his point with a flourish of his hands.

He's come this far without future knowledge and whatever course his life is meant to take, he will find out through the natural progression of time.

With all this thrust upon him, he should be more sceptical, more disbelieving, but there's something about the way the information is presented to him that leads him to believe this may indeed be the truth.

That she knows any of this lends more and more weight to her claims. He has never been so arrogant as to dismiss the idea of life elsewhere in their galaxy; with so much still unexplored, there was no way to know what was out there. Did humanity simply lack the tools to spread out across the final frontier, or were other lifeforms willingly keeping their existence secret?

❝So that's why you came here,❞ he reasons, for if her story is to be believed at face-value, that can be the only logical conclusion. ❝Because you know of my project and if this ship of yours is actually a time machine, you figured I would have the necessary components to restore it.❞

And if time is of the essence, he must, for now, limit his questions to the necessary and pressing.

❝Alright,❞ he says cautiously, ❝from the CIA, then. But what I don't understand is why you thought you could just break in rather than explain the situation. Seeing as you already know so much about me, wouldn't asking for my assistance have been easier?❞

Well, what's done is done.

❝Where is this ship of yours? I'm willing to help you repair it, so if we can get it into my lab, we can take a look at what needs to be done and go from there.❞

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐄𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐃 THE RUSE was called OUT, The Doctor looked toward her psychic paper. There was a moment of bafflement as if she was truly expecting her leather wallet to work. She returned it to her coat, her eyes still locked onto the floor in a moment of amusement before her movements suddenly snapped forward and Doctor Brown suddenly found her hands slammed against the sides of his head— effectively boxing him against the wall as The Doctor leaned in closer. 

"Fascinating!!" She cried out, peering from the nape of his neck up past his head before looking down at him by standing up higher than him. "I wonder if the Brainwave analyzer damaged your mind in any major way." She mumbled, before leaning back down to eye level and whispering softly, "No! No! Nonsense of course it didn't." She hummed before leaning close. "A tricky piece of paper, that thing... plays with the imagination." She hummed quietly, peering at him for a moment before she narrowed her gaze, "And if anything had interfered with that part of your brain prior, you wouldn't have had the dream, would you?" Now, she was wearing her knowledge on her sleeve, but she backed away now— circling his table and pressing her fingers together in mild amusement.

"You want to know the truth? Hm..? Yes... I see, I understand." She painted the picture now in her mind. The Psychic Paper hadn't worked because Emmett Brown truly was just that smart. The Doctor turned to him and she rested her hands on her coat lapel. "The Truth? Hm. Yes. How would I go about it." She exhaled, pacing quietly in place. Finally, her gaze went cold and her eyes narrowed. A tone shift had occurred that created whiplash in the way she carried herself. One moment, she was wiley and sporadic, making loud outbursts and dragging out sentences. Now, she was stern and cold— something not quite there. As if she had some level of authority she was holding over him.

"I—" She began firmly, "Am not of this world." Her gaze narrows, "I traverse space & time." She tilts her head forward to help darken her own gaze, "My ship has been damaged, and I need parts to repair it." She takes one step forward with every word she says, until she's back to being close to him again, "That's how I know who you are and what it is you're working on, Doctor Brown." She stops just before him, eyebrow raised and nose pointed slightly upward, "And because of the precarious nature that is your personal timeline, I must tread with caution." 

"So, for ease that is time..." She leaned forward, giggling quietly about her accidental pun before her serious expression returned, "I am from the C... I... A." 

"Do you understand?"

[indigo-villin]

Vent/Rant post about MH G3

So I am on twitter, tumblr, reddit, and a few other sites.  I no longer go on twitter due to the shear amount of toxicity there and cause it’s boring.

I still go on reddit quite a bit, but now I’m not using reddit for mh g3 news or anything, at least not on the main mh subreddit, I’m just tired of seeing all of the comments against the UNRELEASED g3 dolls and series. Yes many people talk about how excited they are, but just as many talk about the fatphobia they’ve seen when the leaks were first shown, and also many talk about how the dolls have “disappointed” them.

Many people talk about how Clawdeen isn’t as good as the others, or how she “looks younger than the other dolls“ THEY’RE DOLLS, they’re all 15 yrs old (except Frankie who is 15 DAYS old), and we’ve only seen pictures. The dolls don’t come out til the end of the month apparently.

Cleo is apparently lesser than before cause she doesn’t have the same energy apparently..? First off these are different dolls and characters, they won’t be the same. We also have to remember fashion for kids is different now a days, they may not be able to get away with as much as they used to (especially with this gen being aimed at kids as young as 6 this time). The show, the dolls, and everything associated are meant for children, not adults. They’re made to convince adults to let their kids get them.

The dolls are still highly detailed cleo has bandages on her body mold, Clawdeen has fur tufts on her face and body parts, Lagoona has see-through legs where you can see the bone AND she has fish fin ears, Frankie still has their stitches across their body and now has a painted on eyebrow piercing along with an amputated leg, Draculaura still has the heart design on her cheek (and on both on the gore-ganizer doll) along with her hair going from half pink and black to mixed like it used to (again the gore-ganizer doll).

The dolls aren’t gonna be perfect by any means, but to go off and complain about EVER LITTLE THING. People bullied the company into doing this, got the cave club dolls cancelled demanding to have MH back, and now that it is EVERYONE is throwing a hissy fit.

We can’t expect the OGs to just be thrust into the public again, parents then didn’t like them for their overly slim bodies, “scary faces“, and easily breakable limbs. As a company Mattel HAS to make them more kid and customer friendly, and I honestly think they’re doing great so far.

Mattel has clearly learned from watching MGA’s doll lines flourish and designing their own lines like Barbie Fasdhionistas and Cave Club. They made both of those lines with body types different from the standard skinny-mini dolls Barbie and OG mh were. They’ve learned to make BETTER dolls that will actually last kids long enough to properly play with.

Sorry for the rant, I just wanted to get all of this off of my chest. I’m beyond excited for gen3 of monster high, and as soon as I get any of them I’m making a post here/on my doll account.

[daresplaining]

[ID: A page from Devil’s Reign-- three identically-structured panels. The first is Daredevil against a blank blue-and-black background, from the shoulders up and facing forward. He pulls off his Daredevil mask to reveal an identical mask underneath.] Fisk (caption): “It all rushes back to me. Daredevil dug into my mind and stole so much.” [ID: The Kingpin from the shoulders up, wearing a white collared shirt, facing forward and grimacing, with sunlit windows behind him.] Fisk (caption): “The greatest violation I’ve ever known. He stole my victories. He stole my memories...all so he could deny the world the fact that he was sloppy, that he was...” [ID: The same as the first panel, except it’s Matt’s Murdock, mask-less and grinning creepily. His eyes look like black pits.] Fisk (caption): “...Matt Murdock. Matt Murdock Matt Murdock Matt Murdock” Devil’s Reign #5 by Chip Zdarsky, Marco Checchetto, Marcio Menyz, and Clayton Cowles

    I’ve been enjoying “Devil’s Reign”, which has been a huge relief to me after failing to connect with the Daredevil run that led up to it. This event is going some compelling places, introducing fun concepts (I love the team of Otto Octaviuses from different dimensions), and-- most exciting for me-- engaging with plot points from previous Daredevil runs that are long overdue for some development. Specifically, the conflict at the core of this event is the same conflict that defined Daredevil volume 5: the Purple Children’s mind wipe, which undid Matt’s public identity. 

    The mind wipe, for anyone who wasn’t reading DD at the time or has maybe forgotten, had an almost immeasurable impact on the Daredevil landscape. Matt officially made his identity public in 2014 at the end of volume 3, but it had been unofficially public since the “Out” storyline all the way back in 2002. And of course, many people in Matt’s inner circle-- Peter Parker, Ben Urich, Elektra, Matt’s mom-- had known for decades, with that knowledge being a central component of their relationship. The mind wipe erased all of that, building a sudden new wall between Matt and all of his loved ones, nullifying years and years of character-building. Matt didn’t ask for this and the Purple Children had good intentions, but it was a huge shift, highly amoral, and damaging to Matt’s important web of personal connections. 

    And of course, it isn’t just Matt’s loved ones who were affected. The Kingpin, who famously discovered Matt’s secret identity in the “Born Again” arc in 1986, was thrust back into the dark with this change, losing his big, prized weapon against his nemesis. At the end of Daredevil volume 6 (after “Devil’s Reign” we’ll be moving into Daredevil volume 7, with the same creative team but a new #1), he finally found concrete evidence of what had been done to him-- not just of what he lost, but of the fact that he had lost something: papers claiming to reveal Daredevil’s secret identity, which now looked blank to him thanks to the Purple Children’s mental block. (Side note: does this mean the Murdock Papers were real after all? Food for thought...). He was understandably upset. 

[ID: Excerpt from Devil’s Reign. The Kingpin, wearing a black jacket with a purple collar, is yelling at Daredevil from an intensely close range. The street behind them is lit up red and blue from police car lights.] Fisk: “I can feel it! You! You did something to my mind! WHO ARE YOU?!” Matt: “Sorry, Wilson. But it’s called a secret identity.” [ID: He swings away as Fisk watches.] Fisk (caption): “You are the devil. And I’ll tear everything down to destroy you. Because nobody knows you like I do. Nobody else knows your true Achilles’ heel: your guilt.” Devil’s Reign #1 by Chip Zdarsky, Marco Checchetto, Marcio Menyz, and Clayton Cowles

    Thus, underneath Fisk’s scheming to win the mayoral reelection is a new, burning goal: to regain that prized knowledge and crush Daredevil with it. It’s a great motivation to drive the plot of this event, digging into the very real emotional toll that the mind wipe would have had on its victims and taking advantage of one of that plot point’s few positive side-effects: getting to see big, important identity reveals happen all over again, in new ways. The Kingpin learning that Daredevil was Matt Murdock was a huge moment in Daredevil history. It was a huge moment in both characters’ journeys. And I don’t think I can overstate how much Fisk loved having that information.��

[ID: Excerpt from Daredevil volume 1. The Kingpin, seen from the back, wearing his iconic white shirt and purple pants, is standing in front of a huge window, looking down on snow falling on Manhattan.] Caption: “He is the lord of crime. He has gathered the warring gangs of the city, organized them into an army-- no, a business, so efficient and so profitable that the city’s economy depends on the thieves, extortionists, and murderers at his command. He is the Kingpin-- and Matthew Murdock has become the light of his days.” [ID: A close-up of Fisk’s face from the side. He is smoking a cigar and the smoke swirls around him.] Caption: “As Daredevil, Murdock had cost him little, but hounded him, annoyed him, as a fly would. Now, with all the joy of a malicious child, the Kingpin tortures the fly. It began with the revelation of Daredevil’s weak side-- his secret identity. With a few brief phone calls, the Kingpin shattered Murdock’s life, beyond all hope of reconstruction. That would have been the end of it-- were it not for the sweet discovery...” [ID: A extreme close-up of Fisk’s grinning face, lit green.] Caption: “...that Matthew Murdock is a man on the edge-- that even before his ruin, he was nearly mad. Were Murdock tied to a rack, slowly torn limb from limb, begging for mercy, the spectacle could be no more pleasurable to behold. The Kingpin looks at his city and thinks of how wonderful it is to be alive.” Daredevil vol. 1 #228 by Frank Miller, David Mazzucchelli, R. Lewis, and Joe Rosen 

    Now, that’s a guy having a good time. 

    Not only was his mind invaded by an enemy-- a hideous violation all on its own, as he points out-- but something precious and intimate was stolen from him. And as much as you may or may not like Wilson Fisk as a person, the horror, disgust, and rage that he experiences at discovering that this was done to him is easy to sympathize with. I really appreciate this being finally acknowledged, because the more disturbing aspects of the mind wipe-- of which there are plenty-- weren’t explored nearly enough in Soule’s run, in my opinion.  

    The big, climactic event leading into Devil’s Reign #5 and the scene above was a resolution of Fisk’s quest: his discovery that he could use the distilled Purple Man powers that he’d been experimenting with (another really creative and fun aspect of “Devil’s Reign”) to force himself to remember, thus undoing the mind wipe. (This is huge.) He Purple Mans(TM) himself, and it all comes back. Zdarsky even tosses a little “Born Again” mention into the scene to make the situation extra clear. One of Matt’s most dangerous enemies knows who he is again, and just like last time, Stuff is about to Go Down. 

    As mentioned, I love the emphasis here on the horror of what was done, and particularly Fisk’s assertion that Matt committed this sick atrocity just to cover up the fact that he was a little sloppy with his secrets (which is...not entirely incorrect). His hate and disgust come through not just in the writing but in the art as well, with Matt’s creepy grin and shadowed eyes in that last panel. From Fisk’s perspective, Matt is inhuman, demonic, evil, and while that’s obviously an exaggeration, you can’t blame him for feeling this way. That rage breaks through the pristine mayoral façade that he’s still been trying to maintain. He has just been struck with the full force of his decades-long blood feud with both identities of one of his most hated enemies, an enemy who invaded his mind in order to rip those memories away from him, and that is more important than anything else in his life right now. It’s an intense, powerful moment, in conversation with many previous runs while also being impactful on its own. 

[gffa]

Light of the Jedi | by Charles Soule Even after I’d turned the page from this moment, my mind kept drifting back to it, because the context of the story is that there’s so much belief and faith placed in the Jedi in this book, how there’s this sense of the galaxy around them being rather awe-struck by them. As well as moments like this from the Jedi themselves:

And it reminded me so strongly of a conversation between Obi-Wan and Bail in Wild Space by Karen Miller:        "All I meant," [Bail] said at last, his voice tight, "is that it's a shame the other people hurt in the terrorist attacks can't experience the same benefits of Jedi healing that you did." He looked up, then, and his eyes were haunted. "I saw some of them, you know. After. And even with intensive bacta treatment there are now children who'll have to go through life hideously maimed and disfigured. It's…sad. It's cruel. That's all I meant."        The man's compassion was laudable, but his inferences were insulting. "I think what you meant, Senator, is that it's somehow unfair that I'm not sharing their fate," Obi-Wan snapped. And then he caught hold of his temper. Crushed it before he said something truly unfortunate. "It's not because we don't care," he continued, far more moderately. "We do, I assure you. However, healing is one of our rarest gifts. We help as many as we can, wherever we can, and keenly regret that we cannot help more. But are you saying that because we can't help everyone, we shouldn't help anyone?"        "No. I'm sorry," said Organa, shaking his head. "This isn't coming out right. I really am on your side, you know. I admire the Jedi enormously. I am in awe of what you do. But in case you hadn't noticed it, this war has thrust you onto center stage. You're in the news every day. Everything you do is being examined. Magnified. And when the novelty's worn off, it's going to be second-guessed, and maybe even held up for censure. Especially if the war drags on, or doesn't go our way. Because you have been placed on a pedestal as tall as any Coruscant skyscraper."        "That was never our intention, Senator, I assure you."        "I know," said Organa. "But you're up there regardless. You're the Jedi, Master Kenobi. Larger than life and twice as hard to kill. Still, the more systems the Separatists entice or strong-arm to their side, the more suffering and fear the Republic experiences, the closer the Separatists creep to the Core, and the longer it takes the Jedi to end this conflict—the harder your pedestal is going to rock. Especially if it's perceived that you're not suffering like everyone else."        "Not suffering, Senator?" he said, incredulous. "After Geonosis? After the engagements we've fought already? And losing the Falleen battle group? Must the Jedi Temple itself fall before it can be agreed that the Jedi are also paying a price for this war we did not start?"        "Of course not," said Organa. "I'm talking about perception, not reality. The bedrock of politics. I think you'll grant it's one of my areas of expertise."        The least honorable of them all. Obi-Wan nodded. "I concede your point."        "And I wish you didn’t have to," Organa replied. "Master Kenobi, the Jedi have been the Republic's peacekeepers for generations. Citizens are used to you solving their local problems. Their community disputes. But we both know that what we're facing is far more complicated. And I promise you, I promise—when things get really bad you will be blamed."        Curd-and-vegetable stew forgotten, Obi-Wan stared in silence at the Senator from Alderaan.        "I'm sorry," said Organa, turning away. "'You don't have to say it. I'm just a politician. It's none of my business."        Just a politician? No. Far from it. Now it was clear why Padmé liked and trusted this princeling from Alderaan. He was…unexpected.        "The Jedi aren't blind, Senator," he said at last. "We're perfectly aware that our elevation in the public eye is problematic. We opposed it vigorously. We continue to oppose it. We are, as you say, peacekeepers. Not celebrities. The Supreme Chancellor should reconsider his tactics. We feel very strongly there is a chance they could end up doing us more harm than good." That this is a big part of the problem and what went wrong--the galaxy got so used to the Jedi bringing miracles to them, that no matter how hard the Jedi tried to oppose it, the public still demanded that they keep performing those miracles, keep solving all their problems, keep fighting their wars for them. And you see it here, in the High Republic.  The public thinks, “Miracles are for the Jedi.”  The Jedi are expected to bring these incredible feats of nobility and space magic and heroicism, which is great and saves the day!  But you do that for a hundred years and then suddenly, when you can’t save everyone, when you have an almost literal unwinnable war that’s being laid at your feet, and a bad faith government who holds power over you and your own power is basically trapped in this incredibly narrowly defined window and you can’t possibly turn your back on the people who still need your help, all while you never wanted and even vigorously opposed being put on this pedestal in the first place? It just really hit me like a brick how something so good can be turned on the people who just wanted to do their best to help others.

[spidernerdsblog]

Can you write something where Tom takes his girlfriend y/n to a carnival and they go on a rollercoaster and he fingers her making her climax right when the drop happens

Took a little inspiration from the roller-coaster scene in 'fear'. I still don't know how nicole got off that quick lol but it's fiction so here you go. Hope you like this.

Pairing : Tom Holland x Reader

Warnings : 18+, SMUT, mature content, public sex, fingering

A good weather in London is a pretty rare sight and with Tom’s busy schedule you two hardly get time with each other. So you both thought why not spend the day off in a good way and visit the amusement park.

It had been a long time for both of you visiting the amusement park since your high school as you both began to feel nostalgic. You felt like you were back in your teenage years as you soaked in the ambience. The park was bustling with people, children accompanied by their parents and young couples just like you enjoying themselves. You went on a couple of rides taking short breaks in between to gorge on those oily junk food which mostly Tom had to avoid due to his strict diet. 

It was almost evening as the park lit up the neon lights making the sight even more breathtaking. You were walking through the crowd with Tom hand in hand eating your ice-creams when your eyes went to the roller coaster.

“Let’s go to the roller coaster” you exclaim pulling Tom by his hand.

“Ugh” Tom groans feeling tired “we already went on so many rides, Y/N. Can’t we give it a pass for this time?”

“Seriously Tom? Who misses going on the roller coaster in the amusement park?” you nudge him.

“But I’m tired, love” he pouts.

“We can make it a little exciting if you want” you wink at him with a smirk as Tom realizes what you were suggesting at. You guys were always adventurous when it comes to doing the nasty stuff and the thought of doing it on the roller coaster got Tom excited. 

“Maybe I’ll take up the offer” his own lips quirk into a smirk as you both went to stand in the line. 

Soon it was your turn as you both sat inside the front car of the roller coaster. The ride technician pulls down the lap bar over your legs ensuring your safety and then the roller coaster starts with a jerk slowly rolling over the tracks. The cool air hitting your faces as you look at each other smiling. 

Tom holds the lap bar with one hand and places his other hand on your thigh rubbing on the inner side soothingly as you let out a sigh. He slides up further under your sundress, grazing his fingertips over your panties and causing you to gasp. His smile widens at your reaction spurring him on, for better or worse. 

“Fuck you’re soaked” he mutters under his breath as he moves your panties to the side with his fingers and begins to tease your entrance. Your breath hitches as you part your legs a little wider and he takes it as a sign to go deeper and faster. He begins working your clit with his thumb whilst pumping two fingers in and out of you. The fact that there were people behind you totally unaware of the sinful things you two were doing was turning you on even more.

You squeeze your eyes shut, taking in every sensation; the feeling of his thick fingers, the jerking of the ride as it begins it’s ascent on the tracks and the noises of the people in the park. You hold the lap bar tightly, your walls clenching around his fingers as you feel the pressure build inside the pit of your stomach, Tom took that as a que and increases his pace thrusting his fingers hitting your spot as he rubs fast circles on your clit. A small moan escapes your lips as Tom knelts down to your ear

“Shhh, darling,” he whispers, his warm breath sending tingles down your entire body “I know it’s tough, but you gotta be quiet here”

“Tom I’m close” you let out a whimper as your body tensed up.

“Right on time,” he smirks as the ride comes to the drop point “c’mon love, let go” he croons curling his fingers inside you throwing you over the edge.

The ride goes downhill as you release the tension that has been building inside your body coming undone around his fingers. You hold on to Tom’s hand with a death grip biting back a moan. The screaming of the people behind was complete white noise for you as you were floating in ecstasy due to the intense pleasure. Tom slows down his movements helping you ride out your high lazily thrusting his fingers until he’s sure that you have finished.

He pulls out his fingers bringing them to his mouth and sucks them clean as you close your eyes taking in deep breaths trying to calm yourself down, your body still trembling from the orgasm. Tom lovingly wrapped an arm around you pulling you closer to him as the roller coaster swerved through the tracks.

“We should do that again” he remarks with a smug grin.

“Shut up!” you slap his chest playfully and snuggle close to him as he kisses your hairline.